I've been practicing isshinryu for about two years now. newly a 5th kyu.

just started learning how to stumble through Chinto... i want to deepen my personal study of bunkai. i want to be more creative when i go through my kata, imagining many ways to use each move or lack of motion. i'd also like to know of some resources for others' interpretations.

i feel i've been encouraged to rush through a few kata since seisan... seiuchin, naihunchin, wansu, now chinto. i can understand that, and i can see how it is important to first read through a book, for example, before beginning to understand the nuances of each paragraph. i will need to mull over what i have learned for a while before i can really expand on it much. (i hear some say you don't truly begin to delve deeper until you are a black belt... not sure what i think about that, although with the long training and experience will surely come quicker enlightenment)

however, i would like your advice. how do you deepen your study? what do you research? where do you get ideas? do you know of free resources that you recommend, places I would do well to start with?

You're asking a good question, how do you find depth in your training.

The best parallel I can give is if you find a really good book on Tai Chi Chaun that contains an instructors secrets from 50 years of study, it is likely it will take you 50 years to appreciate it.

There are many different approaches to teaching a system. Isshinryu's approach that seems to hurry through the kata, goes back to the way its founder originally taught the Marines, his system in a year or a year and a half (but he taught the Okinawans at a much slower pace).

But the pace you're learning something isn't the issue because you're learning their initial shape.

The real issue is time. I've been doing Isshinryu's Seisan Kata for 30 years. It takes about 10 years IMO for one to begin to relax, regardless of how you practice, hard as a rock or a more relaxed pace. Only when your muscles stop contesting against yourself does your center sink and your power increase.

You have an instructor, trust them and keep training.

There are layers of lessons if you seek them, but they're not found in a book, or a video. They come from always trying to have better technique, and enough training to begin to increase your power during execution naturally.

In the short order, yes intense, correct practice, under an instructor pushing you on small details can make a difference, but it still won't make the difference 10 years of training on any of the kata will.

And that means the kata you learn as a brown belt or black belt still will take 10 years to reach the point for those exercises.

There is much more, but until you can crawl, it's not important what else exists.

I think it is best to learn Kata in stages. First you learn at the earth level ( a block is a block and a strike a strike). You then move to the water level (flowing and evading). Then the air level which consist of much evasion and simultanious striking. at this level blocks are no longer blocks, they are strikes, parries and body manipulations. Eventually you progress to the fire level. At this level everything you do causes pain and damage to your opponent. Kata is the true template to combat. The katas that you named are my favorites and I do believe I have reached the fire level with each ( 30 years). But amazingly enough my instructor still keeps me coming back for increased interpritation. If you are ever in the Pittsburg, PA area email me and Maybe I can enlighten you on some amazing combat bunkia.